Tag Archives: congressman

The New York Times this week had a story about how nearly half of all members of Congress are millionaires — and many of them got that way after getting elected to Congress. This is a disgrace. Congress’s wealth has gone up 15% in 7 years while the average American’s has gone down. Congress is bought and paid for by the 1%. Instead of the rich having just 1% of the influence in Congress, they have 100% of the say. This has to stop now.

Friends, I have many things I’m planning to do in the New Year — walk three miles a day, use an eco-friendly laundry detergent, write fewer anonymous letters to Wolf Blitzer — but I want to declare, right here, that one of my top priorities in 2012 will be to spearhead a drive to remove ALL money from our electoral process, period. Nothing — and I mean NOTHING — we want to accomplish, from creating jobs to protecting the environment to preventing wars, will happen as long as those who hold the purse strings are the ones who own our Congress.

This destruction of our democracy can only be stopped if the majority of us make it clear that we will ONLY vote for those candidates who sign a pledge to make it their TOP legislative priority to push for a constitutional amendment prohibiting any person or entity from donating ANY money to a candidate’s campaign (and that includes a millionaire candidate buying his own election).

Plus, they must pledge to back a law banning elected officials from working as lobbyists after they leave office.

Section 1. All elections for President and members of the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate shall be publicly financed. No political contributions shall be permitted to any federal candidate, from any other source, including the candidate. No political expenditures shall be permitted in support of any federal candidate, or in opposition to any federal candidate, from any other source, including the candidate. Nothing in this Section shall be construed to abridge the freedom of the press.

Section 2. The Congress shall, by statute, provide limitations on the amounts and timing of the expenditures of such public funds and provide criminal penalties for any violation of this section.

Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) has already introduced a “Plan for Washington Reform” that, among other great things, creates a lifetime ban on any member of Congress becoming a lobbyist.

So here is the copy of the pledge we expect those running for office to sign this year:

“I, (name of candidate), promise to make it one of my TOP priorities to introduce and vote for a constitutional amendment that bans all financial contributions to all candidates running for office. I will support legislation that publicly funds all elections and legislation that bans lawmakers from working as lobbyists after they leave office. If I do not do this, I promise not to run for re-election.”

One of the first candidates running for Congress to sign the pledge removing money from politics this year is in my hometown Congressional district of Flint, Michigan! His name is Dan Kildee. He not only wants the money out of the electoral process, he wants corporations declared as NOT people. Dan is already refusing to take any corporate PAC money or any money connected to Wall Street or the banks.

And how have the people in Michigan responded to a candidate like this? The early polls show Dan in the lead — because the voters are sick and tired of the way it’s been for so long.

But, until Dan (and others like him) get elected so they can overturn the rule of the 1%, none of this will change. And under the current system — irony alert — they can’t get elected without money. Wouldn’t it be great if this were the last election I’d have to write a sentence like that?

Will you help me show how powerful the public’s support is for cleaning up Congress by backing the only person running for Congress from Flint who is on our side? This is not just some symbolic cause. I believe Dan will get elected — especially if he has our grassroots support.

Please take a minute to click here and donate $10, $25 or more to Dan’s campaign. He’s pro-peace, pro-choice, and ahead in the polls. He will fight to tax the rich and the corporations like General Electric and Bank of America who pay no taxes at all. I have known this man since he was 18 — when he first won a seat on the Flint School Board. He comes from the working class and he has been a local public servant his entire life.

I’m asking you to do this also as a personal favor to my hometown which is still suffering from crushing unemployment. More people per capita live in poverty in Flint than any other city (100,000+ population) in America. They have no money to donate to a fighter like Dan. That’s why I’m asking you to help in their stead.

Many of you have been writing to ask me what “practical” things you can do to be part of the movement sweeping the country. Well, here’s your chance to do something tangible, even if it’s just kicking in five bucks. Send Dan Kildee to Congress!

And insist that those running for Congress in YOUR district sign the pledge and commit to removing money from politics. We have to start somewhere — and I guess Flint, Michigan, is as good a place as any to begin! Please join me in doing so.

Congressman Anthony Weiner’s weenie has gone viral via Tweets that were sent to at least six women (college kids) with an “@” as opposed to a “D.” The “D” should stand for “Dumb ass” and no more. The liberal Democrat, who was known for his womanizing long before he got married to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s long-time staffer, was caught doing wihat everybody in America seems to be doing: baring their privates to the world, baring their boobs to all of America and the world over the Internet, baring thier butt cracks over their Iphones, showing off shlongs galore.

Congressman Weiner was just doing what everyone else in America is doing – acting like a whore, starring (over the Internet) in their personal porn home movies. OOOOH! How titillating! Weiner should not be pressured to leave office just because he was aping the crassiest of Ameircans. He should not be pressured to seek mental health counseling. He is as sick as 90% of the population. He I want him to stay in office: he is a liberal Democrat who is right on the issues and not afraid to take on the conservatives, who are the real menace to America. Weiner is not afraid to embrace and defend progressive politics. Yeah, he loves to do so on TV, but that’s OK. We Dems need more bull dogs like Weiner. We do not need to muzzle him – or castrate him.

Look around you, people! We are a nation of Anthony Weiners! Spend two seconds around a bunch of teenaged boys – as I did recently – and you see this: 15-year-old boys hovering over a smart phone and looking at photos of girls. “I’m really into lips,” says one kid.

Into lips?

Of course, he’s into lips! The Internet has allowed us to zoom in on body parts, cut and paste them every which way we like. Of course, we don’t see the whole person (head to toe) any more – let alone that person’s personality or soul.

It is a soul-less time we live in!

No time for love! We are more than objectified! We are merely a bunch of body parts – like the chicken pieces at the grocery store. You want only breasts? We got ’em! All packaged real nice! A leg man? Here’s the package! We won’t mention the parts you won’t see in your grocer’s fridge – just go online for that!

How about this nugget from a totally different group of teenaged guys?: “Wow. Like she was the best looking -and she was only 15!” said one kid to another (he was probably around 19 years of age).

Look outside your window and see the 13 and 14 yearold girls walk by – looking like utter whores. Skin tight shirts, velour tops, pierced belly buttons, boob baring tees, low riding jean with thongs and butt cracks exposed for all to see. (I remember my fellow students at Burncoat High Schoool in the late 1970s. Our “uniforms”? Jeans and tee shirts. Izod shirts and these very demure sweaters. Curdoroy pants. Earth Shoes for cripes sake!!! No one was sexed up. Yet all the girls seemed so pretty … .

But back to whoresville – America 2011. A 61-year-old man I know once had a 15 year old girl sit next to him at the old Foothills Theatre. She had her leg against his leg the entire show! After the curtains closed she turned back to look at him – knowingly. (And don’t you know I vented MY feelings re: this instance of whoresville in Worcester. His fault and hers – mostly his – he was the adult)

Like I said, whoresville. Right in Worcester. Personified in a young, white, middle class Worcester County girl. And the pig old man who didn’t set boundaries.

Our girls sexualized beyond belief … .

It is OK for adults to sext, have virtual sex, etc, if it’s to/with a consenting adult. But more and more, this behavior is coopted by our teens – children really.

Weiner is not sorry for what he has done. He is only sorry that he was caught doing what most of America does. Desperate to keep his Congressional seat, he has told the world he is sick and will go into treatment. For what? Being a sex addict? If that’s the case, what about former President Bill Clinton, a guy who could never ever keep his “boy” in the corral? What about John F. Kennedy, one of my heroes? Jackie O. knew her husband was cheating with just about everybody – while president of the USA – and yet the male reporters kept his whoring hush hush. Maryln Monroe sang “Happy Birthday” to him in her breathy, come-hither voice and the world swooned.

I love Marilyn Monroe – she was a briliant actress and wanted her whole life to be recognized as an intellectual. That’s why she married playwright Miller. That’s why she studied Method Acting under Kazan and read, read, read. Would she Tweet? Would she promote her movies over YouTube and FaceBook?

Tuesday, make the world (and Worcester) a better place, please vote for Jim McGovern, one of America’s (in our humble opinion!) best congressmen!

This election cycle incumbent Jim McGovern is up against nutty/racist/cynical Tea Bagger mouthpiece Marty Lamb. Anti- social security, civil rights laws, department of education, etc, etc Lamb makes my blood boil! I damn near wanted to mow him down as I was driving by the DCU Center and Lamb just walked in front of me, arrogant and out of touch – on his way to one of his fake, paid-for-by-the Tea-Party commericals/debates.

“Ugh!” I screeched to my little dog Jett, who is a boon companion and goes everywhere with me. “Pup!” I said, as Jett looked out the car window, “It’s Lamb!”

This isn’t Christine O’Donnel country. This isn’t even Connecticut. And forget Scott Brown. He won the late great Ted Kennedy’s US Senate seat because Attorney General Martha Coakley ran such a crappy campaign and was disliked in general AND Brown, looking every inch the Cosmo cover boy that he was, managed to bullshit voters about how he drove around in a beat-up pick up truck and was salt of the earth and all that crap. Unfortunately, the voters ate all that crap up, and now Scott Brown (who today pretty much disavows his Tea Party connections) has gummed up the works in Washington.

Thank you, Scott Brown! For diddley!

But this is Worcester. Congressional candidate Marty Lamb has a snowflake’s chance in hell when it comes to defeating our Congressman Jim McGovern. The Lamb brigade, flush with money from the Tea Party movement, which gets its money from oil-co. moguls like the Koch brothers and other Right Wing multi-national corporations that hide their political interests/identites by founding very sober sounding right wing/libertarian think tanks that distribute all the gold, want to keep polluting our planet, exploiting immigrants and dis-assembling the New Deal and great Society programs plank by plank, Continue reading Marty Lamb doesn’t have a chance against Jim McGovern→

This election cycle incumbent Jim McGovern has a bevy of Republican challengers nipping at his heels, a la little chihuahuas in doggie day care. They think they can ride the nutty/racist/cynical Tea Bagger wave to Washington. They think they can spew the same crap as Rand Paul and expect it to work here. They will not prevail, if we all do what we have been dong for years – vote for Jim McGovern!

McGovern is one of the most well liked politicians in the region. Why? Because Jim McGovern is a genuinely nice, modest and effective Congressman. Because he not only brings in millions of federal dollars for all sorts of Worcester/Worcester County projects but because he always votes his conscience.

Let’s get past the millions of federal dollars McGovern has brought to Worcester/Worcester County for our streets, highways and byways, schools and parks. Let’s get beyond the fact that if reelected, McGovern will be one of the most powerful figures in Congress. Let’s put aside the political folks lore that under his political tutelege Tim Murray, Joe O’Brien, Jim Augustus and every other local Democratic bright boy blossomed and bloomed to become … political heavy weights in city and state politics. Which translates to more jobs, dough and projects for Worcester. We have never been a Tim Murray fan, but we have always loved McGovern, his political mentor.

In a recent announcement of its office at 901 Pleasant St., Worcester, the Center for Nonviolent Solutions committed itself to providing education and resources for people in the Worcester Area to help increase our understanding of nonviolence and to reject violence in resolving conflict.
On October 17, at the Center’s successful launch at the Worcester Public Library, Congressman James McGovern said he expected to be attending “a meeting.” Instead, he added, he came upon” a movement”—a broad coalition of peace and justice organizations, neighborhood groups, churches, colleges and universities, in the Worcester area.